Reeling from profound grief, Rosemarie Murray went into an unfinished section of a building in Commodore, St Catherine, Monday morning and appealed to God in prayer to exact swift justice on the men who killed her four-year-old granddaughter in a mass shooting Sunday night.

That justice, though, is not for the killers to be caught and prosecuted, but for them to meet their maker.

“Fight for me; I have no one else to fight for me but you, Lord. I believe in you, I trust in you. I have faith in you, Father God. If it was not for you I wouldn’t be here right now. He pointed the gun at me first and you put your shield over me and saved me. Father God, make the killer be put to justice. When people kill the innocent they must die. I look to the sun, Father God. They have to pay. Those killers have to pay. I do not serve a dead God. I serve a living and true God. Father God, from you saved me you can put the killers to justice. They must not go to jail,” the grandmother prayed amid wails of anguish.

“All my granddaughter who didn’t know anything, when a man a go look at a baby like that and put gunshot on her and destroy her, Father God, they must not live. I am asking you and pleading to you, and I am begging, because you know I am serving you truthfully. If I wasn’t serving you truthfully I would have died last night too. Anyweh dem killers deh, Father God, they should not live,” she continued.

Four-year-old Shannon Gordon was among five people slaughtered by gunmen who opened fire on people in a yard in Commodore.

The other deceased have been identified as 39-year-old Iysha Washington; 42-year-old Mario Sullivan of an address in Rosemount District, Linstead; 19-year-old Jushane Edwards; and a 22-year-old security guard who was identified only as Famous Amos.

Four other people, including an 11-year-old girl, were shot and injured.

Edwards’ sister, Simmoneke Walters, had a similar wish for the killers.

“The person who took my little brother’s life, I wish the same for you. My little brother was just 19 years old and you just came and took his life. My brother was jovial. He was feisty, but he was not a bad person, and I am not saying that just because he is my brother,” she said.

“I have another brother who lives overseas. Saturday we were on a live streaming and he told me that he and his mother were going to keep a cake sale. I was frightened to hear, not even a day afterwards, I got a call in the night seh my bredda dead,” the distraught sister told the Jamaica Observer.

On Monday, Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness, National Security Minister Dr Horace Chang, and Commissioner of Police Dr Kevin Blake visited the community. They condemned the killings and announced a $2-million reward for information leading to the arrests of the killers.

Before that, Murray shared what she experienced Sunday when the gunmen, who pretended to be members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF), barged into the yard beside her shop and opened fire on the occupants sometime after 9:00 pm.

“I heard some feet running. When they ran up they said, ‘Police, nobody move.’ They were in police clothes so everybody thought it was the police; so the people surrendered, they didn’t move. One of the men ran down there and said, ‘Who run, who run?’ and kicked off the gate. The dog was giving him a warm time to come in, so he shot the dog dead. The other one turned back and pointed the gun at me and I said, ‘The blood of Jesus is against you,’ and he took the gun off me and then he started shooting,” the grandmother told the Observer.

“I was really wondering if it was the police behaving like that. I held my baby and went in and prayed. The four-year-old was inside the yard as well as an 11-year-old. Nothing was happening in the yard before the shooting. It was just the family in the yard… my nephew, my niece, and others. As usual everybody is always out here talking until they are ready to go home. After the shooting I came out and saw my niece and nephew on the ground. I saw Mario and Iysha on the ground as well,” she said.

Assistant Commissioner of Police Christopher Phillips, who is in charge of Area Five, told journalists that the mass shooting is believed to be gang-related.

“We are strongly of the view that it is gang violence that is playing out in Commodore. We have been monitoring this space for a while and fortunately, for over a year we had not had much… in the Commodore space. It is a shocker to us. We are not going to be daunted by it. We are going to be doing some serious work. Pretty soon we will have a breakthrough in this case,” Phillips said.

“It is a very, very awful scene, I must say. Even the dog was killed. For somebody to turn an M16 on a four-year-old, it speaks to the kind of evil mindset that we have to encounter out there, and that we have people living among us who continue to perpetuate violence and evil intent on our citizens,” he said.

“The entire JCF is now mobilised to treat with this issue and I know that the commissioner of police has been in meetings from morning reviewing what took place in Commodore,” he added.

“The general Linstead area has been doing well since of late. In fact, I have positioned St Catherine North as one of those divisions that we could do a case study on in terms of how we are able to put under control the kind of gang violence we have been seeing over the years and they have been doing very well. This comes as a shocker to us, but we are not going to be daunted by it. We are grieving now and we are really, really sorry that the school has to go through all of this. We are here to support you,” he said.

Phillips said he was told that after the 11-year-old was shot, she was on the ground saying, ‘Somebody help me, the police just shot me.’

He said it was important for the child to understand that it was not the police who shot her.

“That was not the work of the police. She will have to go through a lot of counselling. The family is torn apart and the community is shaken by it. The investigations have started. That is being led by the Major Investigations Division. This matter has the attention of the commissioner of police. I know the minister of national security has expressed serious interest in how the investigation is going. It has the attention of the full force and all our resources that we have. I crave your continuous support,” Phillips told residents.

One woman who was standing outside a shop, told the Observer that she felt as if she was dreaming.

“I am distressed. I was not looking for anything like this. I can’t tell you what happened other than I heard the explosions. It was my first time hearing so many gunshots,” the woman said.

A man described the shooting as a “wicked” act.

“It’s terrible, bro. A camera is not even anywhere near the scene to pick up something. Everybody froze because the man dem run up in police vest and said ‘Police, nobody move.’ It was after the shooting that people started to move. It was traumatising,” he said.

A scene of crime detective retrieves equipment from a vehicle on Monday to assist him with processing the scene of Sunday’s mass murder in Commodore, Linstead, St Catherine. (Photo: Llewellyn Wynter)